


The Three Little Princes

by katie_m



Category: into the woods
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 20:48:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katie_m/pseuds/katie_m
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I was raised to be charming, not sincere."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Three Little Princes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bethfrish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bethfrish/gifts).



Once upon a time, there was a king, and a queen, and three little princes. The king ruled from a beautiful palace at the edge of a great wood, and his subjects were quick to declare that he was the best and wisest king to be found from sunrise to sunset, and that the queen was the loveliest and most remarkable woman of all the area. The princes were also widely praised and reputed to be strong and clever and charming, with the eldest just a bit the superior to the two younger, as the heir to a throne should be. Few had ever actually met the princes, of course, or seen the queen, but people saw no reason to disbelieve the stories they had heard. After all, why would someone want to be ruled by anything but the best?

The three little princes—Rudolf, Frederick, and Leopold were their names—believed in the truth of these stories as strongly as any of their father's subjects. If this belief was at times a bit self-serving, well, we must forgive them; they were still quite young, and their lives were, after all, quite splendid. They had nannies and tutors and dancing-masters and knights to teach them the use of the sword and the bow, and every night they dined on the finest boar or venison, taken from the wood by the royal huntsman. Their father and mother presided over the evening feast in robes and crowns, and all, so far as they knew, was well.

Sadly, not all was as it seemed, for the queen and the royal huntsman had become rather closer than a queen and a member of her household ought to be. We may forgive them, as with the princes, though these two were of an age to know better; and so perhaps we shall not; but they do not care what we think, for they have already gone forward with lingering glances and soft touches and, as they grew bolder, a kiss or two, hidden among the trees of the great wood.

Now the three princes' favorite pastime of all was to go and play in this very same wood. Little brooks became raging rivers, and boulders became castles, and trees became dragons that needed slaying, and they would take up sticks for swords and have a fine time for themselves. They were not, of course, supposed to go into the wood alone, but there were secret ways out of the palace that they had discovered long since, and perhaps also their father thought it was a fine thing for princes to have a bit of high-spirited mischief in their lives, and thus allowed them to take a bit of a risk from time to time.

So one day in high summer, Rudolf and Frederick and Leopold slipped out of the palace and down to the wood. They wrestled and laughed and played, and eventually, to their great delight, came upon a clearing filled with blackberry bushes. They gorged themselves on the berries, and then laid down beneath the bushes to rest.

After some time, they woke to the sound of laughter. When they opened their eyes, they saw, past the edge of the clearing and beneath a great oak, the forms of their mother and the huntsman. He was leaning back against the oak's trunk, and she was pressed against him, looking up into his eyes.

"How fine this is!" Leopold whispered to his brothers. "Mother has come hunting! We shall have an especially tasty deer this evening for supper."

"I did not know that Mother was a huntress," Frederick commented. "Perhaps it's a surprise, for Father!"

Rudolf, though, who was the eldest, frowned. He had been told that, as a prince, he must always know as much as possible about what was going on in his kingdom-to-be. "They don't seem to be doing a great deal of hunting," he said, skeptically. "I'm going to go see what they have to say."

Frederick grabbed his brother's wrist and held on tight. "But we'll get in trouble! If she sees us here, we'll have no supper at all and she and father will fight." While he had never been denied supper himself—he was a prince, after all—Frederick had heard of such things and was forever certain they would happen to him. He was right about the fighting, though. That he knew from experience; Mother was not so pleased by mischief in her sons as Father was.

"I really don't think it would be very polite to bother them," Leopold added. He was too young to be on a par with Rudolf, and knowing this, tended to side with Frederick, who would sometimes treat him as an equal rather than as the youngest.

"We're _princes,_" Rudolf insisted. "Princes are supposed to be brave and princes are supposed to understand things and know what's happening in their country. Anyway that's what I think."

Frederick and Leopold looked at each other doubtfully, but after all Rudolf was the eldest and the heir to the throne. So they dutifully got up from the ground and followed him under the trees and toward the two adults.

Now, as you all know—or at least should!—this situation was not one in which the queen wanted to be seen, especially not by her sons (though rather them, perhaps, than her husband). When she spotted her boys coming through the trees toward her, she stepped back from the huntsman with a great deal of haste.

"Rudolf!" she cried. "Frederick! Leopold! What are you doing out here in the woods all alone?"

"We came to play," Rudolf said, because he had an eye for mischief but did not like to lie. "Why are you here in the woods, Mother?"

"Have you come with the huntsman to get us something for supper?" Leopold asked. He and his mother shared a great appreciation for goose, and he had hopes that his mother's presence meant he would be getting a treat tonight.

Before the queen could reply, the huntsman stepped forward. "I've been setting traps for foxes," he said, "and the queen wanted to see. No supper in that, I'm afraid! Fox is no good on a human's tongue."

"But don't tell your father," said the queen. "Then we needn't have any trouble over your escape to the wood _or_ mine."

_What a foolish thing to say!_ you are no doubt thinking. And perhaps it was. Sadly, the queen, while quite lovely and, indeed, charming, was not the _cleverest_ woman in the country, and at times it showed.

So they all five of them went back to the palace, Leopold upon the huntsman's shoulders, and Frederick holding his mother's hand. The two younger boys felt quite pleased with themselves, awash in the deliciousness of sharing a secret with adults, and laughed and chattered all the way home. Rudolf, though, was rather quiet, and frowned often.

You see, Rudolf had been told that as a prince, he must always tell the truth—especially to the king. And it bothered him that the queen had asked him not to tell; shouldn't that be his choice, as the heir to the throne? After all, one day he would have to depend upon himself when making very serious decisions. Therefore, when the king came to the princes' suite that evening as was his custom, to bid them good night and speak with them about the events of the day, Rudolf took a deep breath and opened his mouth.

"We went to the wood today, Father," he said. "And we saw Mother there, and the royal huntsman. He said they were looking for snared foxes, and she said not to tell you, but I didn't think that was right. Did you not want the foxes to be hunted?"

(Remember, in those days children were children much longer than they are nowadays.)

"Is that so?" the king replied. "Well, I have no problem with foxhunting, certainly. But your mother is very naughty to keep secrets! I shall have to have a word with her about that." But he was smiling, and he ruffled Rudolf's hair before leaving, and so Rudolf felt quite pleased with himself, all in all.

"Mother told us not to tell!" Frederick cried, as soon as the king had left.

"Don't you want to make Mother happy?" Leopold asked.

Rudolf crossed his arms and stood as tall as he possibly could. "I'm the crown prince, and I'll do what I think is best." Then he turned his back on his brothers and climbed into bed. They might only do or say what seemed best in the moment; he would be braver than that! Indeed he felt himself to be a very fine prince that night.

For several weeks things were much the same. The princes studied and practiced their swordfighting and went out riding, and, only once, snuck out to the wood again. Summer rolled on into autumn, and the leaves began to fall. Then, one bright, cool day, the king summoned his sons to the throne room.

He was not alone. The queen was there, though her face was red with weeping, and so were many of the best-bred people of the kingdom, earls and lords and ladies all.

"My dear boys, I have sad news," the king declared once his sons stood before his throne. "The queen has betrayed her family. She ought not to have gone to the wood as she did, and now she will pay the price."

Leopold gaped, confused, and Frederick thought that perhaps she _was_ to be sent to bed without supper, but Rudolf had paid a little more attention than they to matters of state, and was afraid.

"She is to be exiled, never to return to this realm," the king continued. "And her sons are to be exiled with her. But _my_ sons will stay here, with me. Leopold, come to me."

Leopold stepped forward, nibbling on a fingernail.

"Leopold, are you my son, then? Or your mother's?"

Now, the boy was confused, but he knew that he didn't want to leave his country and his palace and his bed and all of his things. So he said, nervously, "I want to stay here, Father."

"And so you shall. Frederick, come to me!"

Frederick stepped forward, hands clenched nervously behind his back.

"Frederick, are you my son, then? Or your mother's?"

As Frederick was still trying to work out what "exiled" meant, he was not entirely sure what to say. Certainly he was both! But he knew that his father was the king, and he was supposed to please the king whenever possible, so with some guilt he said: "Yours, father."

"And so you are. Rudolf, come to me!"

Rudolf stepped forward, frown back on his face.

"Rudolf, are you my son, then? Or your mother's?"

Rudolf did not want to leave his country and his palace and his bed and all of his things; nor did he want to displease his father, who was also his king. But he had been told that, as a prince, he must always set a good example and honor his father and his mother. So he said, with all sincerity, "I am the son of both my father and my mother, and I would be a poor prince if I denied it."

The king sighed, and was quite genuinely saddened; for he thought quite highly of Rudolf. But he had declared his intentions, and even though Rudolf had been the one to first make him aware of the queen's indiscretions, he meant to follow through on them. No son of his would stay without having chosen father over mother—or, as the case might be, kingdom over the unknown. So even though the queen pleaded Rudolf's case most prettily, and the other princes wept for their brother and their mother both, the two of them were packed off in a carriage that very day, and never entered their father's realm again.

Frederick and Leopold were greatly saddened, of course, but their father cosseted them and made much of them, and so they smiled for him as they ought and charmed all the citizenry with their ability to bear up under great misfortune. And if perhaps from time to time they thought to themselves that Rudolf would have been more truthful regarding his feelings, well, they had learned what that would get them. Sincerity, they now knew, was indeed vastly overrated in a prince.


End file.
